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Live as if you were living already for the second time and as if you had acted the first time as wrongly as you are about to act now!50

Michelle had recently celebrated her fiftieth birthday but was not quite ready to admit that she had reached the half-century mark and was dreading retirement age. In fact, she was not happy and not inclined to celebrate anything in her life. Twice divorced and the single mother of two Generation Xers, Michelle’s personal life, as far as she was concerned, left much to be desired. She didn’t feel much better about her work life either. Since her last marriage ended, she had been having a very difficult time holding any kind of steady employment. Whenever she did find a job that seemed worthwhile, it always soured quickly. Over and over, Michelle would find herself stressed out at work, always for some reason that had nothing to do with herself — a poor boss, lazy co-workers, unclear job description, lack of support, and so on. Consequently, she was never satisfied with her work situation and certainly never imagined that she could have a meaningful career path.

People who Glow are able to create a compelling vision that sparks energy and is so exciting and engaging that others are drawn to it.

A vision invites people into the future. It can describe what is important to you and can ignite the latent energy around you. Look back at your igniting latent energy profile in Figure 13.1 to help you to understand where you are now in terms of creating a compelling vision. Recall Ratan Tata’s vision: “Imagine a world where rural communities can access the transport infrastructure so crucial for their development.” It was a vision of the future so engaging and exhilarating that people were drawn to it in large numbers. Great visions like Tata’s are palpable: they actually allow others to think their way into them.

Following are some of the ways I heard people talking about an igniting vision that helped them Glow:

“I could imagine so clearly where we were going—we knew what we had to do, and we were all excited about getting there.”

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“I had spent years dreaming about this. What really seemed to make a difference is that I was able to describe my dream so clearly that others could see what I was aiming at and wanted to become part of what I was building.”

after-hours access to your mail. Dedicated ship-and-receive services seem to provide the best combination of options and flexibility for a telecommuter with mounds of mail, occasional packages and express shipments, and varying degrees of travel.

Do you need a change of address? Review the types of mail and packages you receive, how you receive them and problems you encounter. If you need to change your address, check the yellow pages for options (Mailbox Rental and Receiving) or create a new version of your home address.

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Design Your Office for Efficiency

If even the thought of designing your office makes you panic or begin fantasizing about hiring an interior designer to make it magically appear, this might be an area where you do need some expert assistance. Keep in mind, however, that you ultimately must think through your equipment and furniture needs, space limitations, necessary work flow and requirements, as well as your individual work style. It’s unlikely you’ll get what you need if you attempt to abdicate completely and trust anyone else to design an office that will work for you. So whether you’re planning to work with a design expert or pull together the components of an efficient office on your own, you’ll need to give careful consideration to a few key issues:

In the days that followed, Debbie reflected on all the things she’d learned during her meetings with Jeff. She realized that her time with him had made a profound impact on her. It had certainly changed her leadership point of view. She would never look at leadership or her team in the same way again.

The team had a new energy and enthusiasm that truly amazed her. The performance of the group continued to improve. The goals they set around creating raving fan customers were very aggressive, yet everybody felt they were achievable. They all believed they could move from “worst to first.” They decided the key would be twofold: first, achieving unprecedented levels of customer service; second, working together as a team—not independently, as had been their custom.

All of these changes are the result of actions that grew out of my discussions with Jeff, Debbie thought. He pushed me to become a different kind of leader, and that has made all the difference. I guess it is true: everything rises and falls on leadership.

Pilgrimage is as concerned with taking back some part of the charisma of a holy place as it is about actually going to the place. (Coleman and

Elsner, 1995, p. 100)

Today religion is more threatened than ever, yet sacred journeys are more popular than ever.

(Feiler, 2014)

Introduction

In 2014, Bruce Feiler started each episode of his

PBS series, Sacred Journeys, with the above quote.

If the validity of Feiler’s assertion is assumed, the question of why this might be arises. In his series,

Feiler travels to several of the world’s most well-­visited religious sites, including Jerusalem,

Lourdes, Mecca and the Ganges River. While each of these locations is a popular pilgrimage location, with millions of people visiting these sacred sites every year, Feiler noted that each location has been affected by secularism and religious strife in different ways. For example, some visitors have reported a decline in participation at Lourdes since its 150th anniversary in 2008 (Caprino,

To respond to the never-ending demand for new products and services, executives everywhere are adopting professional business analysis practices to improve their ability to establish and execute strategy. At the strategic level, business analysis best practices aim to formulate the best business strategies, select projects to achieve those strategies, and increase the value project deliverables bring to the business.

Executives are learning that to set the most favorable vision and strategy, they need to dedicate a significant portion of their time and energy to the formulation, execution, continuous monitoring, and refinement of strategy. To formulate and execute a well-formed strategy, leadership teams must anticipate market needs, exploit opportunities, identify threats, and make decisions that support their corporate objectives—a tall order.

A senior business analyst was called to the office of the deputy director of a large state agency. The deputy director, who was relatively new at his job, oversaw a major management effort: a large, complex project to redesign the organization’s internal business processes. As the new guy in the agency, the deputy director lacked a frame of reference regarding project sponsorship. He intended to rectify this situation as he wrestled with the challenging project.

The project manager for the effort had consistently been reporting positive status regarding the project’s scope, schedule, and cost. Despite the favorable reports, the project sponsor felt uncomfortable with the information the project manager provided.

The deputy director explained his situation to the business analyst. Familiar with the project, the business analyst had his own doubts about the project’s status, but he kept his concerns to himself. He commiserated with the deputy director, noting that without additional detail, he doubted he could provide much help.

There are two kinds of people in this world. Those who walk into a room and say, “Here I am” and those who walk into a room and say, “There you are.”

ADVICE COLUMNIST ANN LANDERS

An IT executive approached me before a program and said, “I’m going to tell you something I haven’t told many people. I’m an introvert. I go to conferences like this all the time, but I often bug out of the group meals and receptions because I don’t have the patience for small talk.”

“You’re not alone. A colleague, Jennifer Kahnweiler, wrote an excellent book about that titled The Introverted Leader. She believes many professionals are closet introverts who are out of their element in social situations and business networking events.”

He said, “Another reason I don’t enjoy meeting people is I can never explain what I do in a way people get it. It’s always so awkward.”

I asked, “Want to brainstorm a new way to introduce yourself that isn’t awkward, that can actually lead to an intriguing conversation and meaningful connection?”

The midmorning sun on the new-fallen snow created a glare that was nearly blinding. One of the waiters approached the booth where the enlarged group was seated and asked, “May I pull the window shade for you?”

Pete and Yolanda, who were next to the window facing into the bright sunlight, nodded appreciatively. After the shade was pulled, the waiter cleared the breakfast dishes and poured them each another cup of coffee.

Kip turned to the waiter and said, “Mr. Striker just joined us. I think he wants breakfast.”

Pete took a sip of his coffee and said to Kip, “I really like your description of freedom-based leaders, both the Wise Counsel and the Visionary Leader. But what about staff members—how do you get them to be accountable?”

Striker normally would have waded into the conversation, but he had enough sense to keep quiet and listen.

“I also am interested in this issue,” said Lucy, hoping to keep Hank outnumbered at the table. Yolanda sat back, letting Lucy and Pete run block for her.

Kip obliged. Turning politely to Hank Striker he said, “Yesterday, we all met and began talking about a new approach to managing people. I call it a freedom-based philosophy.”

What we notice, what we believe is important, and what we perceive life should be are the primary components that shape our vision. The more authentically we understand, express, and act on the distinctive aspects of what we see, the greater our contribution will be and the more we’ll fulfill our purpose in the world.

Translating vision into practice is challenging for anyone, but it can be especially difficult for women in organizations. This is because what women see can be out of sync with what the workplace expects. Having entered the workplace in significant numbers and having begun to assume positions of authority and influence only in the last thirty years, women have had little opportunity to shape the culture of work—its values, assumptions, and expectations.

The disconnect between what organizations expect and what women at their best have to offer has become an issue as workplace demands have grown more intense. Companies today require more from their people—more time, greater commitment, fresher ideas, a continual learning curve. Thriving in this environment requires passion and engagement. But it’s difficult to feel fully engaged when your vision, your fundamental way of seeing things, is not understood, recognized, or valued. And it’s tough to feel passionate when you feel unable to bring what is best about yourself to your work.

he Vice President of Operations stood up in front of sixty employees, about 10 percent of the workforce, and announced with pride, “We have achieved our stretch target goal. We have met ‘the 25-cent challenge’ for this quarter, to reduce the cost of production per pound by 25 cents through process excellence. We have tried to reduce the cost of production for ten years. This is the first year we have achieved it. And we got there by involving all of you!”

This announcement was made at the second of three AI

Summits conducted at the headquarters of the Green Mountain

Coffee Roasters in Waterbury, Vermont. The process, led by AI consultant Ilene Wasserman,1 began six months earlier, when the president and CEO, Bob Stiller, expressed his desire to launch an appreciative inquiry into “Enhancing Profitability through

Business Process Excellence,” a task that left little ambiguity about its purpose.

The first step was to create a broadly representational planning team, called the “dream team.” They selected sixty formal and informal leaders from multiple levels and prepared them to go out and interview every member of the organization, plus a wide range of stakeholders. At the summit, the sixty leaders analyzed the stories they collected in the interviews, interviewed each other, and dreamed: “If we could imagine these stories being everyday and ordinary, what would our processes look like?”

The rocket fuel for your development resides in your middle. With awareness, effort, and the appropriate resources, you can quickly turn Hidden Strengths into Learned Strengths. They may never come as easily to you as your Natural Strengths, but they will be equally as valuable to you and your organization.

The Hidden Strengths methodology, composed of four principles, provides an important framework for unleashing your Hidden Strengths and ensuring your ongoing professional development:

1. Leverage your traits, and develop your skills.

2. The middle is the source for your development.

3. Practice, practice, practice.

4. Always be working on your Hidden Strengths.

Being effective in the workplace requires a combination of underlying traits and skills. You are born with certain traits or talents, and they are not particularly malleable. On the other hand, skills are an adaptation to your environment. For example, if you are naturally opinionated and outspoken and grow up in an Asian culture, you learn to be quiet even though you feel the compulsion to speak. Learning to keep your mouth shut when you are naturally outspoken is a skill. The workplace often poses challenges where traits may need to be tempered or leveraged and new skills developed as a response to your organization’s needs.

Structured facilitated requirements workshops, which are formal sessions involving multiple groups, such as end-users, subject matter experts, the project manager, and business and IT representatives, are common. Their goal is to elicit requirements from the group of multiskilled and diverse participants. The output of the session may be text, graphical, or matrix documentation. Workshops can be used to elicit, specify, refine, quality-check, and reach closure on business requirements.

The requirements workshop is most effective when the multiple business areas are undergoing change and are cross-functional in nature. In this case, it is important to understand and resolve conflicts and inconsistencies among diverse perspectives. Meeting with key stakeholders in the same room and hearing different perspectives ensures requirements are complete, and therefore improves requirements quality. Resolving requirements conflicts early in the project is essential to reducing requirements defects that have the potential to adversely impact the success of the project during solution delivery. See Figure 8-1, which depicts the relationship between project conflict and progress.

You may not believe this: Whether you’re a small investor with a few thousand dollars to invest, or a wealthy investor with a few million dollars, or a gigantic pension fund with a hundred billion dollars, you need only consider at most about 10 investment products. The rest are of no use and aren’t worth thinking about.

If you were going to buy a computer, how many brands do you need to choose from? About 10? And the same thing for a smartphone—maybe 10 models, at most? This point applies whether you’re a teenager doing homework or a top executive at a Fortune 500 firm.

Shopping for investments is a little different. You’re faced with tens of thousands of investment vehicles to choose from, offered by thousands of investment firms. There are more than 80,000 mutual funds and ETFs (exchange-traded funds) worldwide. There are almost 10,000 hedge funds. The array is mind-boggling. And it keeps expensive financial advisors busy trying to guide confused investors through the mess. They let you know it’s difficult to choose because there are so many choices.

Climbing the organizational hierarchy is no longer like climbing stairs in a stable structure. The stairs have become rope ladders, with managers clinging desperately for balance. Organization Man is changing into Spider Woman. —Robert Johansen and Rob Swigart, Upsizing the Individual in the Downsized Organization

Leaders need new abilities to flex in response to challenges they cannot predict. Among these are the abilities to use flexible organizational networks and to create new ones if necessary. Organizations must be flexibly firm—flexible, but guided by a firm understanding of their own beliefs, values, and responsibilities. This chapter introduces, describes, and advocates for flexing and flexibility—for both leaders and for organizations. Chapter 10 provides real-world examples of flexible firms.

Economies of scale (where bigger is almost always better) are giving way to economies of organization, where you are what you organize, inside—and especially outside—your organizational boundaries. This chapter focuses on the organization of workplace and workspace, where dealing with dilemmas will actually happen.